If Betty (Draper) Francis Had a Mommy Blog

Oh, Betty. You never fail to fascinate me with your roller coaster of emotions, Grace Kelly-esque beauty and quotable mom moments.

Mad Men's matriarch-in-the-making: old-fashioned Betty Draper Francis, wants to be a good mother and thinks she knows all the right things to do... But times, they are a-changin'. And like so many of us, she doesn't have a flipping clue. More coddling and comforting to neighbor kids than her own children, and confused/personally offended when they 'ruin a perfect day,' (um, you've met children before, right?) Betty Draper, the matriarch-in-training of our beloved Mad Men, gives us an endless supply of epic fails from which to learn, shake our heads and say - 'ok, what happened to me yesterday was nothing!' 

After lunching with her former neighbor-slash-fellow-housewife, Betty leaves feeling less-than adequate and confused because her friend has started working outside of the home. Betty decides that she will make good on her pseudo-sentiments about children being 'the reward' of raising them. She arrives home to the maid helping Bobby with his homework, and announces that she, herself, will chaperon the class farm field trip as opposed to the maid attending. She is very proud of her decision.

All is well on this bucolic farm, a symbolic outing for mom and son, when Bobby offers to trade the second sandwich in his lunch bag for a sack of gumdrops with a female classmate. Betty returns from washing up and discovers the sandwich missing. Instead of swallowing down the surprise and growling stomach, she makes Bobby suffer for his faux pas for the rest of the day. Fast forward to that evening, and Bobby is still getting the cold shoulder from his mom, pushing the food around his plate and shrinking in her disappointment. When Henry, his step-dad arrives home and asks how it went/what happened, Tommy replies: 'I wish it were yesterday.'

Don't we all wish we could have a take-back? I can remember a slew of moments, some I've been brave enough to blog about. Some that haunted me all day. If Betty had a do-over, and was blogging about her adventures the day before, what would she be sharing?

She could be kicking herself for not going easier on Bobby. An entertainment blogger broke down every detail of last Sunday's episode of Mad Men and offered that Betty was hurt and resentful about the gumdrops, because like his dad, Don Draper, Bobby chose someone else over her. Pretty deep, but right on. Unfortunately, Betty doesn't distinguish between adult and child when it comes to her feelings. She holds her older children to the same standards she would an adult. I, too, find myself getting caught up and realize that my expectations are way out of line when it comes to my kids. They start talking and walking and all of a sudden there is this pressure for them to speak and behave a certain way overnight.

Betty and I are both plagued by good intentions. Like Betty, I want my children to grow up and be good people, that's all, that's the motivation. But to be fair, I need to keep reminding my over-zealous self that kids don't get all the little nuances that we have had years and years to grasp. I was being challenged by Big Kid the other day because he was not listening in the store. I had asked him several times to stay by me and stop wondering off. He's at the age where he has all of his own favorite aisles in Target and feels entitled to trail off to electronics or clothes or books. Sorry pal, not yet. This is not a Nick Jr. tween show where you and your friends get to go to the mall food court. "Sam & Cat," you may have won a Kid's Choice award, but mom votes N.O.

When we finally got checked out and were walking in the parking lot, he took an interest in a couple of cool -looking, sporty college-aged friends walking into the store, being goofy, joking around, practicing some sort of fraternity handshake, or playing Rock, Paper, Scissors. Not sure. He was staring, slowed down, turned to keep starting as we were walking away. They were still in half-uniform. He is obsessed with sports. I kept asking him to come along. I took his arm and tried to direct him toward me because he had stopped in the middle of the parking lot. He is sensitive. He yelled in the middle of the parking lot 'Owww! I HEARD YOU AND I WASN'T STARING!' loud enough for the patrons back inside the store to hear us. I caught myself explaining that when I talk to him in lower volumes and ask him to do or stop doing something, there is a reason (and probably ended that sentence with a muffled sigh). It would also be helpful if he did not speak so loudly. His ADHD sometimes prevents him from recognizing some of those nuances. Just like when I ask him for the fifth time to put his shoes on in the morning, all in the same tone. When I change my inflection on the 5th go-round, he snaps, screams back at me to stop yelling at him. And when I clearly have not been yelling, he insists it to be true. He only registered that I was talking to him on the 3rd ask. By the time I got to the 5th ask, he was annoyed and so was I. Luckily, I counted to 10 and braced myself before simply ending my silly one-way conversation. The two friends on their way into Target weren't offended by his staring. It was me who was uncomfortable about it. These are the moments when I want to shake myself. Get a re-do. What I don't do enough is say 'I'm sorry' after one of these clumsy parenting moments. That is what I am striving to work on this week.

Would Betty ask herself why she's not that great at weathering the storm that kids naturally bring with them? You can love them to pieces and feel like your head is going to pop off all in the same five minutes. Kids don't care if it's perfect, Betty, as I have slowly learned over the years. They just want you to show up and listen and be interested and understand when they give your sandwich away to the girl who's mom didn't pack one. They do love you. Sometimes it doesn't feel that way and that can make you wonder if you are worthy of being their mom.

I am guilty of building up this grand plan in my mind of how an activity with the kids is going to go and inevitably, those pipe dreams come crashing down. Why? Because I was setting myself up for an epic fail. Expecting perfection, when all my kids really wanted was a little fun with a mommy who is not so stressed about the fun going exactly as she had envisioned/obsessed/whatever out of whack expectation she was dishing up that day.

Betty, it's OK not to be a perfect mom, really.
Here, a martini will help. (That's my avatar counseling Birdie).

If I were Betty's BFF, I would tell her this when she asked if she was a good mother: you do the best you can. You give all of yourself, whatever that looks like. Whatever you're capable of. You're going to fail a gazillion times and it's not picture-perfect. It's not Stepford or the idyllic little town of Ossining, NY. Betty has been so afraid of failing that she pushes her own children away.

It's questioning if you're doing it right so many times that eventually you just throw up your hands and decide to love them. Love them so much it hurts, get an ugly cry or two in there, fix your makeup like Miranda says and enjoy a cocktail or ice cream or latte, and ask questions later.